


Best Served Cold

by AssortedGeekery



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: Dubious Consent, Gen, Possession, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Revenge, SO MUCH Vomit, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 03:17:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9365651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AssortedGeekery/pseuds/AssortedGeekery
Summary: In which even Ryou has his limits.Or in which we are reminded that someone as good at tabletop gaming as Ryou is ought to be a strategical genius and can use those powers as they see fit.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired entirely by squidbiscuit's YGO art from the other day, linked at the bottom. 
> 
> Seriously folks, READ THE TAGS

Despite popular belief, even Ryou Bakura had his limits. They might have been well beyond what others would have considered normal, and even beyond crazy, but they were there. At times he had the patience of a saint. And the backbone of a doormat. But he did have limits. 

And his yami had finally managed to plow right through them. Naturally. No casual testing or prodding for the slimy, conniving twit. No lighthearted fence hopping. Bakura had all the finesse of a rhinoceros taking out a brick wall, and about that much grace to boot.

 

Two days before, Ryou had woken from Bakura’s possession to find himself in bed- or what actually appeared to be a nest of mattresses, cushions and assorted bedclothes- with no less than seven other people, none of whom he recognized. He was naked, skin peppered with scratches, hickies and a few fingerprint bruises. It tasted as though something had died in his mouth, but there was no attendant headache or nausea as there usually was when Bakura had spent the night drinking. Judging by the crackly smear on his chin, it was something far less innocent fouling up his mouth and making his teeth feel coated. It didn’t take a genius to know what it was, not when taken as a whole with the very specific places he ached and the flaking mess on his chest and belly. Bakura had apparently offered every type of virginity he could to a horde of strangers in a single night of hedonism.

Furious, Ryou was already making plans as he struggled to dress- his shirt was a lost cause, so he took the first one he found that fit and was clean- and slipped out the door. By the time he was home and showering, he had some ideas. Once every inch of his skin had been scrubbed pink and he had brushed his teeth four times, the ideas were coalescing into a single plan. He took himself out for breakfast, thanking whatever lucky stars he still had that he was an early riser even when Bakura had been using his body for questionable nighttime activities. He jotted down details over a full Western-style breakfast, feeling he deserved the indulgence after all the abuse his body had been put through when he wasn’t controlling it.

Despite his anger over the whole business, he felt nothing for the people who had participated in his very thorough deflowering. At the time, someone else had been running his body, after all, and he had no doubt whatsoever that everything that had happened in that pool of cushions and bodies had been very much consensual. The lack of side effects from drugs or alcohol, things he had grown used to identifying and treating, said as much. No doubt Bakura had found them and invited himself into their activities. It was very like him.

Feeling Bakura still sleeping within him, Ryou went shopping for everything he needed. He treated himself to some new clothes while he was at it. After putting his purchases away and hiding a few things, he went back out for a very long soak at the nearest bathhouse. Bakura stirred as he was sinking into one of the hottest pools.

 

_Have you been naked since you woke, Hikari?_

**_Hardly. Some of us have a sense of decency._ **

_There’s so little of you to cover anyway,_ Bakura sneered. _You might as well keep that skinny tangle of limbs on display at all times._

**_I can barely keep_ healthy _with all the trouble you get into when you’re wearing my skin. Anything more than that is out of the question._**

_And what would you suggest, then?_

**_Why do you even care? You only use it when it’s convenient._ **

_I would prefer a vessel more suitable to the man I once was. I was_ magnificent _. Your body is a poor, pale, pathetic substitute for it._

**_If I’m to work even harder at caring for this body, you will too._ **

_You dare to order me, vessel?_

**_I dare. This is the only body you have- you ought to have a hand in keeping it in working condition._ **

He felt Bakura’s anger and frustration bubbling in his veins and pulsing behind his eyes, but the dark spirit made no attempt to take over. Instead, he stewed, silent for several minutes while Ryou moved to a mineral bath he was fond of.

_What did you have in mind?_

**_To start with, you need to start_ bathing _. Hygiene is important and it keeps us healthy. And you’re going to run. I used to run, before_ you _happened. I think our body will still remember._**

_You want me to_ run _?_

**_I’m going to look into getting into a gym. You don’t know how the machines there work, you’re more likely to get us hurt or thrown out. For now at least, I’ll work on strength and you work on endurance. And you’ll need to eat properly._ **

_You go too far, child. I will not be nursemaided._

**_Your call,_** Ryou hummed, climbing out of the pool and reaching for his towel. **_Everyone I know will make sure the Ring is locked up if I die with it. You’ll be stuck somewhere even worse than a tomb in Egypt, because this time people will know what the Ring is for._**

****

The headache from Bakura’s yelling and cursing was worth it. Pleased, Ryou dried off, took his time on his hair, and went home. He jogged, to see if he still could. He didn’t have the distance he had in middle school, but his legs remembered how to loosen and lengthen, and he couldn’t hear Bakura with his heart pounding in his ears.

At home, he prepared meals, packing them neatly into glass containers with colorful lids, and then popping them into the fridge in neat stacks. And if the ones with warm-colored lids (especially red, because Bakura was ever drawn to that rich color) had a little something extra in them…well, that was for him to know about and Bakura to find out.

He placed new body products, new lotion with a scent more suited to Bakura- and with a name like Dark Amber, it appealed to his desire for treasures- new shampoo and soap and conditioner in Bakura-friendly scents in the bathroom and stocked the medicine cabinet very thoroughly. Then, satisfied, he went about the remainder of his day as usual.

 

It was several days before Bakura bothered taking over again. In that time, Ryou had held up his end of the bargain, purchasing membership at a gym near his apartment and going shopping for new gym clothes when it turned out he had grown out of his old things, unless he wanted to wear his gym uniform from school. That was something, at least. It was hard to tell he’d grown when he lost so much time to Bakura’s nonsense. He went to the gym, kept himself clean, and ate through some of the pre-made meals he had stocked the fridge with, shoring up his reserves of time for later by getting as far ahead on the summer coursework he’d taken on as he could. He even found a little time to spend with his friends, picnicking in a park near the Game Shop and teaching sly card tricks to Joey’s clumsy fingers with Duke and Mai. Tristan knew better than to attempt the card tricks, but he had picked up Duke’s tricks with dice quickly.

 

It was a Thursday morning, early enough still that he was lounging in bed before the alarm, when he felt Bakura rising inside him like a shadowy tide. He let go and sank into it before Bakura could even begin to command him. 

Bakura inspected the foolish exercise clothing his vessel had purchased. Japan might not be Egypt, but surely baring so much skin in the heat of summer was unwise. He cast the garments aside in favor of the jeans and shoes Ryou usually wore, supplemented with a shirt he had torn the sleeves off of months ago. He would not run the streets like some messenger, but perhaps there was sport to be had in running and climbing.

Hours later, Bakura determined that there was, in fact a great deal of sport to be had in such activities, but he was regretting most of it. The clothes he wore were not crafted of a material that managed sweat or excessive activity well, especially not the jeans. He nearly limped back into the apartment and stripped on the spot, cringing as he peeled the sweat-damp material away from his thighs, which were chafed and burning. His feet ached as well- he had seen little difference between the shoes Ryou usually wore and the ones he had bought for exercise except the obnoxious colors (the new shoes had more electric blue on them than he felt was necessary), but perhaps he would try them later and see what difference they made.

 

Ryou stirred in his chest like a flutter of wings against his ribcage.

**_There is lotion in the bathroom, and a cream for the blisters. Next time dress properly._ **

_I do not need your help, vessel._

**_You do if you want to have a nice body to keep using. The lotion will sting a little when you put it on- that’s what happens when you rub your skin nearly raw like an idiot._ **

****

He made to snarl a curse and force the sniveling little brat down into silence, but Ryou had already slipped away again, settled within his mind to wait.

There are two bottles of lotion on the counter in the bathroom. One he is familiar with, a picture of mangos on the label and a sweet-tart scent he considers far too feminine and childish for him. But the other…ah, the other looks like it is for him. The bottle is a rich, dark color and the crimson label has metallic script on it. Dark Amber…yes, that must be his now. It was so new that Ryou had done nothing but remove the wrapper. It smells musky and rich in his hands. Pleased, he applied it and found the coolness alone to be soothing.

 

But an hour later, while the stinging was long gone, he _itched_.

 

And an hour after that, he _still itched._

 

The blisters, at least, had ceased bothering him, but that really only made it harder to ignore how terribly the insides of his thighs itched. He changed into a pair of the shorts Ryou had bought, blood red with two thin black stripes down both sides, then hiked the legs up higher and sat on the couch, legs spread as wide as he could manage. After a moment of resisting the urge to scratch himself bloody, he snatched up a magazine and began cautiously fanning the tender skin. It was red and irritated and appeared to be developing a rash.

He managed another fifteen minutes or so before reaching deep inside himself and yanking Ryou to the surface.

 

_Vessel! Something has gone wrong with your body._

Ryou stirred lazily in spite of the rude awakening.

**_You mean you did something to it? Again?_ **

_I did nothing!_

**_Give me control. I’ll see what I can do._ **

****

There was nothing for it. Bakura receded, letting Ryou take control. He lingered at the surface as Ryou inspected the rash, sighed, and went to the bathroom. Once there, he read the tiny print on the back of the lotion bottle Bakura had used.

 “Well that explains it,” he murmured, turning on the shower.

  _What explains it?_

“I’m allergic to lanolin, and it’s in this lotion.”

_Then why did you have it?_

“It was a gift. I hadn’t even had time to smell it, let alone read the ingredients.” Ryou stripped and slipped into the shower, carefully cleaning the remains of the lotion from his skin. “Why didn’t you use the open bottle first?”

_It smells like a confection, not a grown man._

“I like it, and it’s safe for my skin. Which you would know if you cared to keep this body in good condition. You didn’t even _shower_ after you came back from your play outside. That’s _disgusting_.”

Bakura answered in a silent snarl and sank away to brood for a few hours.

 

Friday and Saturday were hell on Bakura. He _did_ put on the exercise gear Ryou had bought- and found the shoes to be wonderfully comfortable- and he even smeared himself with some oddly scented potion Ryou said would help protect his skin. It said ‘Sun’ on the label, which was helpful. There were so many bottles in the bathroom that he rarely knew which he was meant to use, and for what purpose.

Apparently there was more than one ‘sun’ bottle, and he had chosen the sun tanning lotion instead of the sun block. Hours out in the searing summer sun left every bit of exposed skin very pink, very hot and very tender. Ryou chided him, applied clear goop called aloe, and muttered over the golden tan their skin took on after the burn had faded.

That was Friday. Saturday, he made an effort to bathe after entertaining himself as early in the morning as he could stand, to avoid the sun. He even went so far as to trim his nails, loudly complaining about lily-skinned child-men who couldn’t stand so much as an hour under the sun before their body rebelled while he worked.

Later, after he had accidentally drawn his own blood nearly a dozen times and the heavy press of his greasy hair on the back of his neck tempted him to cut it all off, Ryou explained that the curved clippers were for the nails on his hands, to avoid the sharp corners Bakura kept scratching himself with. He also explained that the jar of thick, soothing creamy stuff in the shower was for their skin, not their hair, which explained the awful weight of their hair.

Ryou showered again, trimmed the edges off his nails, and braided his hair back before going out for the afternoon, knowing Bakura was in too much of a snit to take over again until at least sunset.

Bakura went for another rambling run that night. On Sunday, he deigned to stay put. Ryou went out again, and lectured him through a beginner’s weight-lifting class at the gym.

  

Monday, Ryou woke up just long enough to feel Bakura take over. He sighed and went back to sleep.

Bakura took a great deal of care with himself that morning. He hadn’t had a whole day to himself in more than a week, as each time he had tried, he had done something to his body that required Ryou to treat it.

He ran and climbed and leapt in the early morning light. He had put on the correct lotion for protection against the sun, and read every incomprehensible ingredient on the back of a tube of gel stuff Ryou said would make him smell less ripe after his run. It was cold and it went on his armpits, but there didn’t seem to be any side effects.

He put on lighter pants than Ryou’s favored jeans in order to go back out in the heat to meet Marik, the only companion he and his vessel shared. Marik could be wicked enough even with his own darkness banished to satisfy Bakura’s needs to get into trouble, and he was both gentle and intelligent enough to spend time with Ryou without starting an argument. Thinking on that as he foraged in the fridge for lunch, Bakura noted that he hadn’t been in a good fight in weeks. The body was in good shape…perhaps he and Marik could find themselves somewhere to brawl. With this in mind, he fetched out a red-topped container and ate the contents cold. Whatever Ryou’s reason for stocking the fridge like this was, it was convenient.

 

Perhaps half an hour later, he was walking through the more industrial part of the city that bordered the shipping yards with Marik, both of them on the lookout for trouble. Dockyard workers were usually good for that sort of thing, but it was the wrong time of day. Mid afternoon, it was hot and close, the air thick with the threat of a summer storm. Down between the warehouses where they walked, it was oppressive and nauseating. Bakura longed for the dry heat of the desert, where at least sweating would cool him a little. Here, the sweat made everything _worse_.

His stomach rolled, protesting the heat and continued activity. He belched, ignoring the look Marik gave him, then lurched forward with a startled grunt, clutching at his stomach as it continued to roil.

“Hey, what is it?” Marik asked, taking a tentative step forward. “Are you al- _GAH_! What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

Bakura tried, for no real reason he could actually name, to cover his mouth with one hand before a second belch turned wet and sour. All that did was make more of a mess, vomit running down his hand and arm to drip from his elbow. It was hot and sticky and it reeked, and that alone would have been enough to drive another heave if his stomach hadn’t already been gearing up for it.

Marik danced backward with a disgusted yelp, one leg of his pants sodden from knee to ankle, and fell against the wall of a warehouse, gagging a little himself.

In front of him, Bakura tried to get down on one knee for a little support, but jerked forward with another retch and ended up with both knees on the cracked asphalt and both hands planted in the puddle of his own vomit. The pavement was hot even under the mess, burning his palms.

Holding his shirt collar over his nose and mouth, Marik scuttled forward and awkwardly gathered Bakura’s hair into his free hand. He couldn’t do much about Bakura’s bangs, but even sweat-damp and drooping in the heat, they retained enough personality to stay out of the way on their own.

“Just….uh….just get it out,” he advised, staying as far away as he could without pulling Bakura’s hair. He craned his neck back, face turned skywards. “And then I’ll get you home.”

Getting home was easier said than done. The storm broke on their walk to the nearest bus stop. Marik sat stiffly on the still-hot metal bench inside the bus shelter while Bakura leaned against the outside of it, heaving intermittently onto the scratched acrylic. The heavy rain finally took out his bangs’ remaining structural integrity, but it also washed away any vomit that might get into them, so it hardly mattered.

It was only with the best acting Marik had done in some time that they got on the bus at all- the driver had taken one look at Bakura and tried to get them off his bus. He relented, handed Marik several trash bags, and watched them closely as they sat down.

Bakura fell asleep on the return trip, and Marik had to carry him awkwardly up several flights of stairs and feel him up to find his keys. When he did wake, it was to scramble for the bathroom with his hands over his mouth, dimly remembering Ryou doing the same during a bout of food poisoning months and months ago.

Come to think of it, that was probably what had happened to him. Ryou would have words for him when the timid creature bothered to rouse again.

Marik hung around until Bakura hadn’t thrown up for an entire hour, then made a hasty exit, promising to come back the following day in case Bakura was feeling up to attempting more mischief.

 

Bakura felt well enough to bathe on Tuesday, muttering to himself as he cleaned dried gunk off the Ring. Prior experience kept him from destroying anything in the laundry, which was good, since Ryou seemed to be ignoring him.

 

Marik arrived, creeping cautiously in with the keys he’d forgotten to return the day before and two milkshakes.

“You look better, at least. Ryou took over and got it taken care of?”

“I am capable of managing my own body,” Bakura snapped. “What are those?”

“These? Milkshakes. I know it’s not the best thing after you’ve been sick but it’s too hot out for tea and they had one with ginger, which _is_ good for your stomach.” He offered the pale one to Bakura. “Unless you’re still feeling sick…”

“I’m fine.” He snatched the drink and held his free hand out. “Keys.”

Marik handed them over. They both ended up on the couch, debating the merits of going out in daylight again or waiting for evening and running the risk of Ryou waking up and taking over again.

Out before sun down it was, then, but not before they ate.

“What _is_ all this?” Marik asked, peering at what remained of the neat stacks of containers on two shelves.

“His latest hobby, apparently,” Bakura grumped. “Each one contains a meal. A small one, if you ask me.” He got up and reached across Marik to select a container with an orange lid. “But they are convenient.”

Marik shrugged and chose a red one. Between the two of them, they polished off a third, this one with a yellow top that contained an entirely vegetarian concoction. It sent Bakura back to the fridge to be sure there was at least one more, wanting to enjoy it later when sharing wasn’t necessary. Whatever it was called, it was _good_.

 

 

They ended up back down near the docks again, this time on the side where goods came and went by land and one freight line was loaded. It was hot still, but not as badly as the day before. The storm lingered overhead, dark clouds threatening more rain, but they hadn’t gotten around to it just yet. For the time being, it was all muggy pressure and the promise that maybe it would be better later.

There were more people around- two ships had come in during the rain the day before, offloading postponed by the rain, and there was a lot of activity around the yards as dockworkers rushed to unload before they got backed up.

Marik looked for someone they might easily start trouble with, trying to distract himself from the pain growing in his belly. Tense, tight pain, sharper when he breathed. Almost like before the kind of belch that made his sister swat him and scold him for manners when he let one loose in her presence. And with the pain came nausea, drenching the back of his neck in a sudden sweat. At first he thought it was the heat, but when his stomach flopped, he couldn’t help thinking of yesterday, and how fast Bakura had gone from fine to barely able to stay upright.

“H-hey….Bakura?”

Bakura looked at him, and Marik cringed. If he looked like Bakura did, then they were likely in the same boat; Bakura had gone an unhealthy color. His lips were pressed tightly together, and there was tension at the corners of his eyes as well, a general expression of severe discomfort and…confusion? As he watched, Bakura swallowed convulsively.

“ _What_?”

“That…w-whatever you had yesterday?” Marik found himself swallowing hard as he stomach did a slow roll. “I think… _urp_ …m-maybe it was contagious?” He gave in to the urge to hug himself, gingerly cradling his stomach as if that might help any. It flipped again.

Bakura nodded faintly. “It hurts,” he rasped. “Before…it didn’t…”

 “ _Hurts_ ,” Marik agreed. “We…we should go…”

 “Go _where_? We’re in- _hrk…nnh…”_

Marik spotted a corner of space that probably served as a break area for the dockhands. It had benches and a few picnic tables, and it would serve. His legs were starting to feel loose and weak; he doubted either of them had the strength to make it to the nearest bus stop.

 “There,” he groaned, pointing.

 They both staggered over, bent nearly double. Bakura had started making noises that made Marik think of the temple cats before they brought up a hairball, which was not a pleasant mental image. They both sat on the same side of a table, canted slightly inwards towards each other for support.

 “H-how long have those lunches Ryou m-made been in there?” Marik asked weakly, squeezing his eyes shut against a wave of pain in his cramping gut.

 “F-few days,” Bakura responded, drawing one foot up onto the bench and all but clinging to it, as if that would help. “He…he replaces them…”

Marik dug in his pockets with shaking hands and unearthed three hair ties. He handed two to Bakura and used the third to scrape as much of his hair back as he could manage. Bakura’s hands were far too unsteady for hairdressing, as it turned out, forcing Marik to pull the fluffy mass of white back into a perky tail himself. He would have laughed and taken a picture if he’d thought he could hold his phone without dropping it and that laughing wouldn’t make him puke on the spot.

“ _Gods_ ,” Marik groaned, and belched. It was loud and wet-sounding, and it made the back of his throat burn.

 “Don’t _do_ that,” Bakura snarled. “Bad enough I have to be here like _this_ with _you_ , don’t make it _worse_.”

 Marik opened his mouth to respond, to snap back, perhaps to fish up some appropriate insult like he usually did, but at the same time he felt liquid heat rush up his throat. He all but threw himself forward, legs spreading in a vain effort to get his boots and pants out of the way, before his throat tightened. He gagged once, then vomited with enough force for some truly horrific backsplash. It was thick and cloying, leaving his mouth feeling coated, something he realized was probably because of the milkshake. He thought he might never be able to drink one again after this.

Beside him, Bakura had managed to give himself hiccups. Every one brought up a little splash of vomit, making it difficult for him to catch even a breath. Marik would have been worried for him if a second clenching in his belly hadn’t driven him off the bench entirely. Bending over had put too much pressure on his stomach; being on all four relived it, and he retched noisily.

 “Hey, you two kids, what- _ugh_!”

Across the street, a small knot of dockworkers approached, then recoiled as one when the smell hit them.

Bakura got unsteadily to his feet, no doubt intending to get them to back off further, but standing had much the same effect on his rebellious stomach as kneeling had on Marik’s: it released the pressure. He brought a hand up again- hadn’t he _learned_ from the day before? - and deflected the rush of puke onto his chest and arm. He made a weak sound of disgust and dismay before another heave forced him to take a knee.

Three of the dockworkers approached, each of them wearing a mask and gloves Marik had seen others wearing around some of the fishing boats.

 “ _Fuck_ , look at these two,” one of the men groaned as Marik threw up again. “Drugs?”

 “Don’t think so…booze?” a second suggested.

 “Doesn’t look like it,” the third noted. “Too much junk food in this heat, I bet.”

 Two more men, similarly protected with masks, gloves, and full-length rubber aprons approached.

 “Hey, where should we take you?” asked the man who had guessed the problem was alcohol. “Got someone to call or something?”

 Marik fumbled at his back pocket with wet, slippery fingers. He nearly sobbed when his clumsy hands couldn’t get a proper grip, but one of the men reached over and carefully freed the phone for him.

 “Anyone in particular?” he asked, scrolling through Marik’s contacts once he had managed to croak his password between retches.

 “ _Anyone_.”

 

 

“You are both _imbeciles_ ,” Yami informed them.

 Marik stared blearily at him. He and Bakura shared an inflatable mattress in Duke’s garage. They also shared a blanket, and the same drowned-rat appearance. Before loading them into a delivery truck, the men at the dock had tried to clean them up with buckets of water. It had been reasonably effective, but they had both been drenched. Duke had supplied them both with t-shirts and lounge pants from a shipment of merchandise- Bakura had almost snickered when Marik had had to put on a pair of ladies’ pants to compensate both for his aching, nervy stomach and his decidedly shapely backside, but he was too queasy and exhausted to make it past a smirk.

 “If you stress them into puking again, I will _end you_ ,” Duke informed Yami from the doorway. “Seriously, they just stopped, like…half an hour ago. It was _awful_ and now I’m probably going to catch it. Why’d you have to call _me_?”

 “Didn’t,” Marik mumbled, flattening a hand against his stomach. All his core muscles ached fiercely; the bumpy ride in the back of the truck had triggered a bout of projectile vomiting so severe he thought he might actually tear something, and when he’d collapsed against the side of the truck afterwards, he had smacked into an o-ring for tying down tarps and given himself a black eye. “You’re f-first in contacts.”

Bakura nodded faintly. He was leaning so far over he was almost lying down, barely supported by an empty crate that had once contained tabletop figurines. It was sheer force of will keeping him awake at all- two days of whatever it was that plagued him was exhausting. He was sporting a uniquely demonic look in spite of the colorful t-shirt he had on: at some point he had managed to burst a number of capillaries in and around his eyes, leading to bruising around both eyes and a red stain across the white of the left one.

“And _that one_ sicked up blood,” Duke continued, ignoring Marik and jabbing a finger at Bakura. “Not a lot, but he must’ve been sick for awhile for it to be that bad. Can happen if you puke really hard- ‘ve done it before.”

 “They were spoiling for a fight,” Yami muttered. “And received a just reward for it.”

“Isis’ll _kill me_ ,” Marik groaned. “C’n you just…take us back to his place?”

He didn’t really fancy another trip just yet, especially not with Duke’s typical break-neck driving style, but he was ready to be somewhere familiar and safe now. He and Bakura had spent the better part of an hour in the dicemaster’s home, Marik in the master bathroom and Bakura, with his smaller frame, in the tiny half-bath off Duke’s office. Every second _alone_ in an unfamiliar and unwelcoming place just made him tense up further, which made him feel sicker and which, in turn, made it harder to actually throw up properly.

Duke sighed heavily. “Guess we might as well try. Help me get them into the car?”

 

Yami lectured on the return trip, voice raised over the sharp tattoo of rain on the roof of the junky hatchback Duke owned. Marik managed to keep the few sips of sport drink Duke had gotten into him where they belonged, but it was a near thing. Bakura didn’t- ten minutes into the ride he had his face buried in the trash bag Duke had shoved at him and was gagging. He’d thrown up twice before they reached Ryou’s apartment complex, and Yami had to hold the bottle of sport drink so Bakura could drink a little without wearing it.

 

They were further lectured on the floor in Ryou’s hall- they had taken the elevator, but as soon as the elevator car lurched upwards both Marik and Bakura had started retching again- and they’d needed to just _sit_ once they exited the thing. Yami took full advantage of the opportunity, going into great detail about all the terrible things that awaited those who continued with such degenerate behavior.

 

Yami and Duke left them sprawled against each other on Ryou’d couch, rain-damp, sweat-stinking, aching and exhausted.

 It took Marik a minute to realize that he was actually _seeing_ the hazy pair of tennis shoes on the rug in front of them, rather than imagining them.

 “Hey, uh…Bakura? Look.”

 Bakura looked. Ryou stood before them with his hands planted on his hips. Marik could see the TV through his stomach, but he _was_ there.

  _“Have you learned your lesson yet, yami?”_ he demanded. His voice echoed slightly, as it tended to do when any of them spoke without a physical mouth to speak through.

 “What lesson?” Bakura snarled, and Ryou smiled so sweetly that Marik _knew_ they’d both been had.

  _“The lesson about how little you can do for yourself, and how much you rely on me and my control over the body,”_ Ryou said simply. _“You’ve been a **wreck** these past few days.”_

 “Did…you _did_ , you stinking whelp, you _caused this_!”

_“I did, yes. Marik, I **am** sorry you got dragged into it.”_

Understanding dawned on Marik’s face. “You put something in the lunches…”

Ryou nodded. _“Ipecac. In most of the ones with the red, yellow and orange lids.”_

 “What is that?” Bakura asked suspiciously.

 “’s to make to puke,” Marik mumbled, gingerly rubbing his stomach. “A lot. Like, if you eat poison or something by mistake.”

 “And the rest of it?” Bakura demanded.

  _“Everything else you did to yourself because you insist on not listening to my advice,”_ Ryou said firmly. _“I would have told you to read ingredient lists, what I’m allergic to, what the things in the bathroom are for and how best to take care of our body if youd’ve asked. I was in the middle of telling you to check the label on that lotion **while** you smeared it all over our skin.”_

 “But you _knew_ it would itch!”

  _“I did. It was worth it.”_

“Why you-“

Marik hit him with a couch cushion. “Shut up and _listen to him_.”

Bakura growled at him. Ryou waited, one insubstantial foot tapping. _“I can do this all day,”_ he warned. _“It will only use up the energy you need to feel better sooner.”_

“Then speak, hikari,” Bakura growled hoarsely.

_“I have resigned myself to your continued presence. Rather than waste my time trying to get rid of the Ring and your filthy self, I would rather focus on my own life. Which means my body needs to be in good condition for working, school and anything else I want to get up to. And to keep it that way, **you** have to start doing your share of the work. That includes feeding yourself properly, and…”_

Marik closed his eyes and listened to Ryou lecture. It was a much sweeter sound than Yami’s scolding- Ryou’s had a point, after all. It was all things he knew, and it wasn’t directed at him anyway. Funny to think that he took better care of himself than Bakura did, when Bakura actually _wanted_ this life and Marik had spent most of his wishing to be dead.

Marik helped clear out the fridge before he left, staggering home to fall into bed. He mumbled some excuse to his sister about mild food poisoning and slept for the better part of the next twelve hours.

 

 

Bakura allowed him to tag along on the morning run/climb/jump sessions, some days. If there was a little thievery and mischief-making in the mix, well, that was just part of their nature. Marik traded what he knew about grocery shopping for Bakura’s training in faster lock picking, and his skills with a stove for Bakura’s with a knife. Things worked out.

 

And the next time Bakura had a delicious plan that might foul up something Ryou had already arranged, his stomach twinged at the memory of his little vessel’s revenge and he came up with a new plan.

 

* * *

 See the art that inspired the fic [HERE](http://squidbiscuit.tumblr.com/image/155871826841)

 

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact: consumption of thick substances that have a coating sort of effect on the stomach can delay onset of ipecac's effects. Usually involves bloating, cramping and pain.


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